


Familiar

by rcvival



Series: Unter [1]
Category: Death Stranding (Video Games)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Discipline, Frottage, Humiliation, M/M, Spoilers, Temporary Character Death, Top!Sam, takes place midgame
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-02-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:53:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22525105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rcvival/pseuds/rcvival
Summary: Higgs lifted his head up blearily and tried to open his eyes. Eerily all Sam could see were the whites of his scleras before Higgs was able to unroll his eyes and gain some semblance of focus again. Sam shoved the last piece of the ration into his mouth and clinked his cufflink halfway off to get himself off the grid. Residual effects of the supercell, he’d explain later.
Relationships: Sam Porter Bridges/Higgs Monaghan
Series: Unter [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1620700
Comments: 2
Kudos: 93





	Familiar

His ears rang, an awful high pitched sound that he could feel at the back of his teeth. It took a moment for him to register the cacophony of bangs as distant gunfire piercing through the haze of his mind. His muscles sprung into action before he had even fully opened his eyes. _Cover, cover,_ he looked around and finally found it behind the remnants of some ruined structure. Derelict buildings of a bygone era loomed around him, not unlike the structures rising from the tar Higgs summoned. 

He had confronted Sam near one of the more remote shelters around Middle Knot City. A flurry of sparks and cadence of voice any thespian would be jealous of. The wind had been violent and timefall had poured in that region without a pause since early morning. The thick tar covered the ground in mere seconds and rippled with something monolithic moving beneath. 

“I’ve got something special for you today, Sammy,” Higgs had taunted with a sing-song voice and a menacing grin, his golden mask raised towards the sky but the following crash had seemed to catch them both off guard. The ominous green of the sky had come out of nowhere. 

Higgs, who had floated atop the tar, felt the effects of the rapidly rising wind first, though Sam wasn’t far behind. The porter turned to run towards the shelter, away, anywhere, but the wind pushed him flat on his back, then pulled upwards, sending him toppling into the sky.

It wasn’t the first time he had been caught in a supercell but these weren’t the barren trenches he had seen before. A skeletal figure ran past him and Sam’s breath caught in his throat. His hand shot to the alarmingly empty weapons rack on his backpack but to his relief the figure kept running and eventually was caught in a hail of bullets. His eyes found the rifle the skeleton left behind and he bode his time for a sprint as distant explosions sent shockwaves through the air. Higgs was nowhere to be seen now and looking for him was the furthest thing from Sam’s mind. He knew how he had gotten out from the warzone last time and he could only hope the same spell worked twice.

* * *

It’s not game over yet.  
It’s not game over yet.  
It’s not game over yet.  
It’s not game over yet.  
It’s not game over yet.  
It’s not…  
It’s not…  
...game over…

His chest barely rose with the movement of his breath. Fast, shallow, his lungs were filling with blood. His hands were splayed over the wounds on his chest in a futile attempt to staunch the flow. He tried to blink, get the dark out of his eyes but the world kept on dulling. 

He tried to reach around him with every little morsel of power he still had. His fingers curled, his whole frame shook with the exertion and he let out a cry of frustration, agony. It couldn’t end like this, it couldn’t, she wouldn’t allow it. She had to come for him, his goddess.

Amelie...

She had to, he told himself, he begged, he prayed.

A gurgling sound rose from his throat and he let his body go lax against the wet ground. He blinked away black tears from his tired eyes. 

A hand on his cheek went unnoticed at first. It wasn’t until his head was carefully turned in gentle hands that his eyes fought to find something to focus on besides the pale sky. The pain had somehow numbed and been replaced by a feeling of weightless submersion. He wasn’t sure if he was still breathing. He couldn’t discern the expression on Sam’s face.

It was a gentle tip from an edge of reality when he started to fade away. He had walked the beaches of countless others and most of his life, he had felt closer to the dead than the living. It was a funny thought to have, and he gave a tired chuckle at the absurdity of it, the fact that he had never before visited his own.

Maybe he wished he could have been able to summon one last ounce of defiance in the face of the great abyss.

But there was nothing left.

* * *

Sam had come to, bloody and nauseous, on the ground a little ways from the shelter in front of which Higgs had confronted him. The comms had been back online as he could deduct from the continuous ringing of his cufflink. He had brushed Deadman off, said his injuries weren’t anything he couldn’t deal with on his own. Most of the blood on him wasn’t his, anyway. Mama and Heartman called with their own theories of how Higgs was able to summon the supercell, something about his DOOMs being even higher than they had even been able to imagine.

Sam hadn’t really been listening. 

His attention was fixed on the figure on the ground in the distance. His focus didn’t return before Die-Hardman came back online and asked if he knew what had happened to Higgs. There was a cold feeling at the back of his neck as he stood over the other’s prone body. Higgs’ chest was rising shallowly and blood dripped slowly from between the fingers clutching his chest. 

No, he didn’t know, he had said and his voice sounded distant even to his own ears. 

He couldn’t tell why he felt the way he felt when he touched his fingers to Higgs’ clammy skin and turned his head to be met with unfocused eyes. Higgs had done nothing but make Sam’s life hell. He was the reason his sister couldn’t come back home and Sam had to trudge across America to get her. He should have called the terrorist in, gotten Bridges to come and get him. His body. He wasn’t going to make it. But Sam wasn’t able to lift his hand from the other’s cheek. His pinky and ring finger were gently on the underside of Higgs’ jaw where he could feel his heartbeat. 

That was until one last beat, it just stopped.

He had strapped the body to his backpack, leaving behind the heavier armor he could easily remove from Higgs. He didn’t know what happened when someone with high DOOMs went necro, and he was sure Deadman or Heartman or Mama could tell him, but he didn’t bother, just wanted to make sure it didn’t happen. Just in case. He could make it to the nearest incinerator in time.

When he felt a slight nudge at his back, he thought he had just imagined it. The hoarse cough on the other hand was unmistakable, and it made him stop dead in his tracks. Sam hurried to unload his cargo to get the corpse disposal bag unzipped. Higgs was deathly pale and still unconscious but he was breathing, and the barely-there shallow breaths turned into wheezes as soon as fresh air was allowed into the confines of the bag.

He hadn’t wanted to risk taking him to a shelter where Bridge was likely to spy on them, instead he had chosen a nearby cavern and set Higgs on the ground against the wall. Sam’s cargo was neatly piled near the entrance and Lou’s tank was safely tucked out of view. Sam sat on the opposite side of Higgs and bit into a ration bar warily as he kept an eye on him. Higgs had coughed up tar and blood but seemed otherwise out of it. Sam had tied his hands behind his back even though he doubted it would hold with the power Higgs had. 

All of this was stupid and reckless and he was painfully aware of it. His mouth turned and his fingers tapped against his knee irritably. He had seen something in Higgs when he lay dying in a pool of blood and mud. The feelings that had passed through his unfocused gaze were something raw and unfiltered, something that hadn’t been for Sam to see. Yet it made him seem so terribly human. He had wanted to let him pass in peace and not let Bridges hoist his cold dead corpse up as a sign of victory. 

But of course he couldn’t have anticipated Higgs to be a repatriate like himself. And from the way he looked when he had passed over, he doubted Higgs had expected it either.

Higgs lifted his head up blearily and tried to open his eyes. Eerily all Sam could see were the whites of his scleras before Higgs was able to unroll his eyes and gain some semblance of focus again. Sam shoved the last piece of the ration into his mouth and clinked his cufflink halfway off to get himself off the grid. Residual effects of the supercell, he’d explain later.

He didn’t say anything and Higgs didn’t seem to notice him at all. He stared into the ground for a good while before trying to move his bound arms. That’s what gave him pause and made him lift his eyes up to see Sam. He didn’t look shocked or surprised just… blank. He looked towards the light coming from the entrance of the cavern and blinked a few times as his eyes adjusted, then he laid back to rest his shoulders against the stone wall. 

“You proud of yourself, Sam?” he asked, his voice raspy and lacking its usual lilt, “You caught me, no more Homo Demens, no more nuisance for your masters at Bridges.” His eyes had slipped closed in the middle of him speaking.

Sam studied his face for a moment. “You’re a repatriate,” he stated simply. 

Higgs opened his eyes and turned to look at him before his gaze lifted again. He didn’t say anything, a furrow in his brow.

He hadn’t known.

“That was the first time you died, wasn’t it?” 

No response. 

“The man in the supercell, who’s he?” he tried a different line of questioning.

Higgs’ expression turned and he chuckled, “This an interrogation now, Bridges? What do you think you’ll get out of me?” he shifted on the cavern floor and brought his knees up close to his chest. 

Nothing, he supposed. Sam didn’t know what buttons to press, talking wasn’t his specialty. He took out his canteen and brought it to his lips. Higgs turned to look at him from the corner of his eye, his gaze trained on the bob of Sam’s adams apple. A pink tongue darted from his mouth to wet his chapped lips, he swallowed.

“You thirsty?” 

He took the silence as a yes and got up. 

There was a slight withdrawal, barely noticeable, as Sam knelt before him. He brought the canteen in front of Higgs’ mouth. The terrorist eyed him warily, impossibly sharp eyes hooded under impossibly tired lids. His chest still rose with labored breaths and his lips were parted to ease the airflow. Finally he canted forward to accept the offered drink. His brow furrowed in distaste and he gagged as the sweet amber liquid hit his tongue but that didn’t stop him from gulping hungrily.

Higgs swallowed a final time and lay his head back against the cave wall. He could barely see skin peeking out from under the tar still covering his face and clothes. Sam's eyes dropped down to eye his chest where a dozen or so bullet holes still decorated his armour. Higgs tensed and pulled his knees closer to his chest.

The proximity was uncomfortable and Sam shifted on his knees, “What happened to you?” he asked lowly. 

He caught a wild surprised look on Higgs face but didn’t have time to process it. In a blink of an eye there was a knife thrust right at his face. Sam didn’t even register it at first, just moved to stop the arch of Higgs’ arm as a gut reaction. He slammed his forearm to Higgs’ chest and the arm with the knife against the cave wall. The knife went flying out of his grip but the next thing Sam knew, was red hot pain spreading from the centre of his face. Higgs had slammed his forehead against him full force and was now struggling to get to his feet. Sam sprang after him and managed to get a hold of his ankle and yank him back before he got up and used his larger mass to pin the other man face down on the dirt. 

“You summoned somethin’ you couldn’t control, that it?” Sam grit out as the other man struggled beneath him. He sat back over Higgs’ thighs to stop him from trying to kick him off and wrung his left arm behind his back to restrain him with pressure on his shoulder.

“You have no idea what’s going on, Bridges,” Higgs spat out between hard pants, his head canted back to eye the knife lying just out of reach. He still tried to shake Sam off but when he didn’t budge, near hysterical laughter bubbled up from his chest “You have absolutely no idea.” 

Sam twisted his arm further back and up until the laughter turned into a wrung out breathless cry. Higgs didn’t stop fighting all at once, still kicking his heels against Sam’s back and wriggling like a pinned snake, but eventually he stilled and just tried to tense to accommodate the hold Sam had on him.

He could hear his own hard breaths in the following silence. Higgs’ DOOMs must have still been out of whack since he hadn’t blinked out of existence yet. Sam wondered how long that would last. He had been prepared to toss his body into an incinerator and be done with it but now he was completely at a loss as to what to do. 

He tightened his grip, pulled his arm just a bit more until Higgs’ breath hitched and turned sharp and short. He could feel his muscles tightening and loosening under him, his chest pushing fully against the ground and his cheek into the dirt as he gave up trying to tense against the hold.

Sinew and muscle stretched beneath Sam’s strength and he doubted anyone could fault him for taking a little pleasure in the way Higgs’ breaths turned into sobs. Higgs deserved it and he deserved much more. Adrenaline was pumping through his system and making him jittery. He could feel the beginning of an erection and Higgs wasn’t helping matters with the way he shook under him.

He held him for long enough that his own muscles started to feel tired and sore. Higgs’ breath had become much calmer even though it still hitched from time to time. Sam reached for the strand Higgs had cut through and found an intact piece long enough. With it in hand, he brought Higgs’s strained arm down into the small of his back. Higgs let out a muffled groan but he didn’t try to fight him. He found his other hand on the ground and repeated the same motion until he could hold onto both of his wrist at the same time and secure the strand around them. 

He carefully took his weight off the back of Higgs' thighs, wincing as his muscles protested, and took hold of his shoulder. “Come on, get up,” he said gruffly. 

He did most of the work in getting Higgs to his knees. He pushed himself up to his feet and pulled Higgs with him even though it took a few tries to get him to move. Blood had pooled and congealed above his top lip from when he had headbutted Sam and more dirt stuck onto the tar covering his face.

Higgs was unnaturally quiet and kept his head down. He didn’t feel steady on his feet and Sam kept a hand on his shoulder to make sure he stayed upright. He let his gaze run down his body to scan for signs of injury, but he stopped at the obvious tent in Higgs’ pants. Sam’s gaze lingered too long for comfort apparently since he had barely time to slam Higgs against the wall again to avoid another headbutt. 

“That what got you so riled up, huh?” he asked with another shove, hard enough to knock Higgs' head back against the rock. The violent thrumming in his body was back at full force and he pressed his knee between Higgs’ legs pointedly. Higgs bit back a noise somewhere between a yelp and a whimper as he tried to get away from the press.

“Fuck off, Bridges,” he spat out, but the harsh words lost their power at how high strung and panicked he sounded. His pupils were blown wide and beneath the tar, Sam could see a tinge of pink high on his cheeks and on the tips of his ears . Sam’s throat had gone dry and he was reeling, his cock now painfully hard and he couldn’t pretend it was simply from the fight anymore. 

But he was also pissed and he was tired and he didn’t want to deal with Higgs’ bullshit or the unfamiliar possessive, violent urge. “This what you tried to hide, huh?” He pressed his thigh harder between Higgs’ legs and was rewarded with a strangled moan. “That getting roughed up by your enemy gets you all hot and bothered?” 

Higgs’ eyes snapped to him and he gaped with pupils blown wide.“You were just waiting for this, huh? Bet you coulda jumped any time you wanted to.” Sam didn’t know where the words were coming from but he didn’t seem to be able to stop them once they started. Nor did he want to, for the way Higgs’ face contorted with equal parts of shame and arousal. His eyes squeezed shut and his hips stuttered against Sam’s thigh in helpless small thrusts.

Sam sucked air into his lungs through his teeth and pressed even closer on the exhale. “Can’t believe all I had to do to shut you up was a knee between your legs.” He could feel the tightening in Higgs’s lower stomach, one that made him bend forward against Sam and hide his face against his shoulder.

A part of him wanted to grab him by the hair and pull his head back to look him in the eye and see the humiliation sinking in. But he just stood close, closer than he had willingly stood to anyone since Lucy, and let Higgs whimper and rut out the aftershocks against him.

Higgs started to still and after a while, he lifted his head up slowly not meeting Sam’s eyes. He had rubbed some of the tar off on Sam’s jumpsuit though fresh smeared black tears decorated his flushed cheeks. His lips were swollen and wet like he had been biting them. He looked absolutely wrecked and out of it.

Sam’s cock throbbed.

Higgs swallowed hard, opened his mouth and looked like he was about to say something. He didn’t. Instead, he closed his eyes, and a moment later Sam’s chest hit the cave wall as the man suddenly vanished in a cloud of orange sparks.

Sam groaned and his hand shook as he lifted it to rub at his sore face, carefully avoiding the center of the damage on the bridge of his nose. His fingers came back bloody anyway. The arm dropped to his side and he rested his forehead against the cool stone instead. He stayed like that for a good moment while arousal and adrenaline still coursed through him. He adjusted himself in his jumpsuit but the dead silence of the cavern was working like a dunk into an icy cold river as the reality of what had just happened started to sink in.

Somewhere in the tips of his fingers, he could still feel the exact point where he had held Higgs, just on the edge of dislocating his shoulder or breaking his arm. He had gritted his teeth to get a hold of the violent surge within him but the threat had been there, the frightening tip over the threshold so close within reach. He knew he had thought about it before, fantasized about the kind of things he had done to Higgs but they weren’t desires he ever imagined he would actually involve himself in.

With a shaky sigh he turned his back towards the wall. A part of him was happy that the burden of deciding someone’s fate was out of his hands again. Still it didn’t stop the guilt from sinking its vicious claws into him. The right decision was so clear in front of him now, it was so easy without the man in question in the same room. He didn’t give a shit about the Cities or rebuilding America, but he knew what the right decision would have been for Amelie.

He sighed one last time before pushing himself away from the wall and going to pick up the cargo he had left near the entrance. Lou pressed her face against the glass of the pod when Sam connected her, she stared at his bruised face with her big, worried eyes. “It’s nothing, Lou,” he said quietly. It’s nothing, he’d probably say to Bridges as well, he thought, as he reluctantly clicked his cufflink fully around his wrist and online again.

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to Vigils (https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vigils) for the beta! 
> 
> All the remaining mistakes are mine!


End file.
